EghtesadOnline: Around 24.45 million passengers were transported by Iran’s railroads in the last Iranian year (March 2017-18), showing a 6.3% rise compared with the previous year, the deputy for passenger affairs with the Islamic Republic of Iran Railways said.

Mir Hassan Mousavi added that about 6.1 million passengers were transported by the country’s suburban railroad system, registering a 16.6% increase year-on-year, the news portal of the Ministry of Roads and Urban Development reported.

Saeed Rasouli, an IRIR board member, said rail freight transportation stood at a record high of 46 million tons during last year, indicating a 14.4% growth compared with the year before.

About 40.2 million tons of goods were transported via rail in Iran in the previous year (March 16-17), which was also a record high, according to Financial Tribune.

By contrast, some 430 million tons of waybills were issued for road freight transportation last year, which dwarfs the volume transported by rail.

“As per the Sixth Five-Year Development Plan (2017-22), the share of rail freight transportation is targeted to reach 30% of the total cargo transportation via land. Therefore, IRIR has set the goal for transporting 82 million tons in the current year,” he said.

The goal set by IRIR seems too ambitious since it failed to reach last year’s freight transportation goal of 62 million tons.

As per the plan, the share of rail from passenger transportation is targeted to reach 20% by 2022.